‘Your City Could Be Better’: Nashville’s Grassroots Ethos Is Alive and Well in Chattanooga

Sometimes it can feel like the Nashville government is two (or more) steps behind the needs of its neighborhoods. Enter the residents of Chattanooga, Tennessee. What Chattanoogans don’t have, they make up for in advocacy, whether by showing up to city council and organizing for change or just doing things themselves. City Cast CEO David Plotz sits down with creator and city lover Hope Henchey about how she and her neighbors are sneakily and secretly fixing up their city. You’ve heard of the Nashville bench builders — now get ready for the Chattanooga pothole fillers, sidewalk layers, and (literal) trail blazers.

Mentioned on the show:

• Atlas Obscura feature on the community-built benches in Chattanooga
• Efforts by Strong Chattanooga to make a path through the woods in a sidewalk-less neighborhood
• Review of Hoboken's streak of zero traffic fatalities 

Is there something your city is doing that we should be talking about? Email David now! 

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